“Elite Force unites the sometimes warring factions of electro house, techno, and breakbeat, like a peace keeper who values the spirit of cooperation and tolerance. He was forged in the fires of breakbeat, which has always had a habit of sucking in sounds that pass by. Elite’s sets are like a team performance, with tracks coming from all corners of the bass-driven sector, to create a vibrant hodgepodge of boundary-pushing dance music….“

[Beatport]

Simon Shackleton's Elite Force project began way back in 1996, debuting on his own newly founded Fused and Bruised label with a series of peerless 12s and remixes. After five successful years winning plaudits from the likes of Fatboy Slim & Jon Carter, he put Fused and Bruised on the backburner to concentrate on production work. After several years with Whole9Yards and Moonshine he became a primary artist on Adrift Recordings (formally known as Kingsize) before moving on to build his own empire under the U&A Recordings banner.

On the decks, Elite Force has been a prime mover since 1990 when he cut his teeth playing huge student nights and self-promoted acid house nights in the South West of England. Since then he has become known as one of the top technicians on a circuit that has included massive shows in Belarus, Hungary, Australia, Italy, USA, Czech Republic, Russia, India, Turkey, Spain, Japan, Georgia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and China, amongst others, as well as numerous festival slots including Burning Man, Glastonbury, Shambhala, Coachella, Kazantip, San Francisco's Love Parade, Wickerman, Breakfest, Secret Garden Party and the Glade.

As a remixer, Elite Force has always been in huge demand, with legendary re-workings for the likes of Grandmaster Flash, Groove Armada, Crystal Method, Jungle Brothers, Stereo MCs, UNKLE & Infusion all contributing to his reputation as one of the most creative and effective remixers around.

Elite Force's music has also been the soundtrack to many a movie, with a huge list of impressive A-list credits to his name, including the likes of the Matrix, Charlie's Angels, Arlington Road, Mortal Kombat, Crow, The Bone Collector, The Jackyll, Spiderman 2 ' and his music has appeared on a wide array of TV shows, from CSI to Top Gear, from Football Focus to LA Doctors. He's also soundtracked a number of computer games, including no fewer than 5 FIFA games, several of the Wipeout series, The Matrix and Motorstorm 1 & 2, and in 2011 he co-wrote 50% of the music to hit game Motorstorm : Apocalypse alongside Oscar-winning composer Klaus Badelt (Pirates of the Caribbean / Gladiator).

After releasing one of the most forward thinking albums in dance music (‘Revamped, 2010) to huge critical acclaim, Elite Force embarked on a bruising DJ schedule & has continued to destroy clubs and festivals alike with his bag of bespoke edits. He enjoyed a unique first when his Revamped album was released, having all 14 tracks inside the overall Beatport top 50 (all genres) thereby holding a 35% share of dance music's most popular tracks. By the end of 2010 he enjoyed 4 of the top 10 best sellers of the year in the Beatport Breaks Chart including the #1 with M.A.D., as well as having seen no fewer than SEVEN of his tracks and mixes hit the number ONE slot over the course of the year. Subsequently he has received no fewer than 10 Breakspoll Nominations in the last two years, taking home the Awards for Best Producer and Best Label.

2012 saw the release of RVMPD2, an album of re-inventions, remixes, mashups and originals featuring an A-List cast, including Skrillex, Primal Scream, Adele, Deadmau5, Muse, Nero, Chemical Brothers and a host of legends from the world of electronic music, which enjoyed a sensational 250,000 global downloads. RVMPD3 is in the works and is scheduled for release, initially on vinyl-only at the end of 2013 following a sold out vinyl run of the highly acclaimed ‘Gamechanger’ single early in 2013.

Elite Force’s reputation as a pioneer has continued through 2012/13 with the establishment of The One Series, a series of club nights founded on the simple principal that good DJs should have a chance to tell a story through their sets. The One Series features One Room, One DJ, playing All Night, and these parties in locations such as San Francisco, Burning Man, Forcefields (Simon’s own invite-only Festival that launched in 2013) and London have quickly become legendary, unmissable and uniquely immersive events.

For many of these longer DJ sets, Elite Force has begun performing under his real name Simon Shackleton, which has co-incided with his creation of uber-cool Electronica imprint STEREOPHOENIX. He has also written and produced close to an album’s worth of material, set for release early in 2014, and already supported by the likes of Laurent Garnier, Sasha, John Digweed, Jody Wisternoff, Nick Warren, Christian Martin and many more. With the mantra ‘Electronic Music With Heart & Soul’ this is an exciting new parallel chapter in his distinguished career.